Front to back: Senior Airman Ben Smeland, a software applications technician with the Air Force Weather Agency's 2nd System Operations Squadron at Offutt AFB, Neb., and Senior Airman Russell Pyle, also a software applications technician, work on streamlining code for the Gridded Analysis and Display System used by troops world wide. Photo by G. A. Volb.

Senior Airman Nathan Fried uses a laser range finder to gather data for visibility charts Jan. 4 in the Panjshir Province in Afghanistan. He spent two days in early January training members of the Panjshir Provincial Reconstruction Team to take weather observations to help make aviation-support and convoy-operations decisions in the Panjshir Province. Airman Fried is assigned to the 20th Expeditionary Air Support and Operations Squadron at Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan. (Courtesy photo/Oref Spanta)

A Delta IV rocket launches at 5:53 a.m. on Nov. 4 from Vandenberg's Space Launch Complex-6. The rocket carried a Defense Meteorological Satellite Program satellite in to space. The satellite will transition into a polar earth orbit to provide weather forcasts for servicemembers on battlefields around the world. (Photo by Thom Baur)

A record-level solar flare erupted Sept. 7, 2005, disrupting high-frequency communication for the flare's duration. Notifications included geographic locations and levels of radio frequencies that would potentially be affected.

A Defense Meteorological Satellite Program nighttime image of Hurricane Rita churning in the Gulf of Mexico Sep. 22, 2005. The DMSP F-16 satellite image from 8:59 p.m. (CDT) Sep. 22, is a multispectral image that uses both infrared and visual satellite imagery to produce a color composite that reveals clouds and lights. The infrared portion is in blue, showing clouds, and the visible portion is in yellow, showing city lights. Image courtesy of the Air Force Weather Agency.